Beer news in nyc

From August, 2011

A long delayed love letter to Mission Delores: Park Slope’s (not-so) newly popular drinking spot, a solid reason to visit the positively NOT industrial Fourth Avenue. Excellent placement with nearby businesses Rock Shop (which opened soon after MD) and Oaxaca couldn’t be better. Since moving to the Slope, Delores has become my favorite bar, period. A chill atmosphere and superb beer selection are obvious highlights – but there are a lot of soft factors going to the California-inspired establishment as well: STAFF: Knowledgeable and friendly, with a penchant for conversation. PINBALL: LoTR and Indy? Yes please. Anything functional in the…

For those of you who homebrew or follow beers being brewed at this time you know that hop harvest is upon us. This Friday our local homebrew shop, Bitter and Esters, will start getting shipments of fresh hops. They still have hops available at $25 a pound (they recommend using five times the amount of dry hops you would normally use at the end of the boil). Here are the varieties available: Cascade – available Friday September 2 Citra – arriving Wednesday September 7 Chinook – arriving Wednesday September 13

As many of you know, we are big fans of Founders Brewing Co. beers. Recently they started a Backstage series of 750 ml bottles and we were very excited. The first in the series was Blushing Monk, which they had apparently brewed as a one-off beer back in 2007. We were surprised by just how red the beer was – almost like a red wine – and by the short-lived pink head on it. The beer was dominated in both smell and taste by the raspberries used in fermentation. It smells as though you’re putting your face in a basket of…

This weekend our good friends got married in Albany. It was a fantastic wedding (the only one we’ve ever been to that didn’t have any macro beer, by the way), in a barn, with paper lanterns, wildflowers and great music. We figured that by leaving the city, we’d escape Irene. Not so much. The morning after the wedding, reality set in that we were going to be staying in Albany longer than we anticipated. With flooding all around us and the Thruway closed, we sat in our hotel lobby feeling slightly lost, until we heard that – hooray! – a…

We’ve lived in New York City for three years now. And Thursday was the first time we’d been to the Brooklyn Brewery. As beer bloggers, this is unacceptable (maybe when we lived in the Bronx it was excusable, but since we moved to Brooklyn, definitely not). So when, during the press preview for NY Craft Beer Week, a tour of the brewery and its new expansion was offered, we were on board. As has been widely reported, the expansion will greatly increase brewing and packaging capacity. (Interestingly enough, according to tour guide Carla Villa, the space they expanded into was…

This evening, the Brooklyn Brewery hosted the press preview for the fourth annual NY Craft Beer Week, which will be this September 16-25. Representatives from Dogfish Head, Empire Brewing, Captain Lawrence, Brewery Ommegang, Shmaltz Brewing and Goose Island (breweries which will be featured during the week) were on hand, and in between sipping brews, we sampled locally produced artisan foods. “There’s no better time to be a beer drinker in New York City,” said Josh Schnaffer, director of Craft Beer Week (above). “You can learn a little more about beer, and the city as well. That’s really what Beer Week is…

CANCELLED DUE TO HURRICANE IRENE Long Island breweries keep getting more attention for their high quality brews, and this Saturday some will be featured at Breukelen Bier Merchants. Barrier Brewing Co., Great South Bay, and Blind Bat Brewery (a nano-brewery we are dying to try) will be there with their beers to talk with visitors. Here is the lineup from the Breukelen Bier website: Barrier: Antagonist ESB, Mollycoddle & Dubbel Down. Blind Bat: Vlad the Inhaler, Hellgate Golden Ale, Honey & Basil Ale Great South Bay: Blonde Ambition, Snaggletooth Stout & Robert Moses Pale Ale We highly recommend the Mollycoddle from…

Heartland Brewery has been a mainstay for us when in Manhattan and in need of good, fresh, local beer. With locations at South Street Seaport, Union Square and midtown, Heartland delivers solid beers and pub-style food within easy walking distance of most of the places we go in Manhattan. They don’t get a ton of attention for their beers but they are brewed by Kelly Taylor, who also brews the Kelso beers (in our experience he usually hits the mark), and several of them are really solid. In particular, the Farmer Jon’s Oatmeal Stout is among our favorites of the…

This was a pretty awesome weekend (more on that later). On Saturday, we headed over to Vanderbilt Avenue in the very warm sun to pick up some Immersion tickets and support the local beer scene. We didn’t make it to all the stops (some required brunch), but instead settled in at Hot Bird for the late afternoon. We were finally able to taste Brooklyn Brewery’s The Concoction (originally The Tonic) which was the free beer at Hot Bird. Part of the Brewmaster’s Reserve series, The Concoction is inspired by a cocktail called the penicillin. It’s one of the most aggressive beers…

This Saturday the Prospect Heights neighborhood will see some great neighborhood events. We are excited for The Total Vanderbilt Ave Immersion from 12 p.m. – 6 p.m. Several stores along Vanderbilt Ave will have deals and promotions for those who pick up a free Immersion Card. Several locations will even be giving away Brooklyn Brewery beer for free (doesn’t that mean it’s extra delicious?). Hot Bird, where you can pick up a card, will be serving cups of The Concoction which we have been looking forward to trying. The Vanderbilt will offer some Local 1 with your brunch while Le…